Then I Did
by DizzyDrea
Summary: The line fell silent once more. And it wasn't a comfortable silence, either. It was awkward and laden with words unsaid. Words they both knew needed to be said, but were both afraid to say. A Life's Sacred Blessings story.


Title: Then I Did  
Author: DizzyDrea  
Summary: The line fell silent once more. And it wasn't a comfortable silence, either. It was awkward and laden with words unsaid. Words they both knew needed to be said, but were both afraid to say.  
Rating: PG  
Spoilers: Ripple Effect  
Author's Notes: Once again, the Rascal Flatts bug bites. I really should get some bug spray, except that the stuff is wretched, and my Muse would probably disown me. Set after Season 9's Ripple Effect, yet another in a long string of moments between Jack and Sam.  
Disclaimer: Stargate and all its particulars is the property of MGM, Gekko, Double Secret, Acme Shark and a lot of other people who aren't me. I am doing this for fun and for practice. Mostly for fun.

ETA 7/13/15: I unearthed this on my hard drive this weekend and thought maybe I should publish it. It's the only remaining unpublished story from the Life's Sacred Blessings series. I have no idea whether I'll ever go back to write the rest, but at least I've now got all of the written ones published. This is an older fic, so I apologize for the quality. It's unedited, and done in an old style that I haven't written in for ages. Still, I like the story well enough as it is to publish it without trying to fuss with it first. That, and I'm just too busy - I've got a big bang to finish, so my attention is elsewhere.

~o~

Lieutenant Colonel Samantha Carter's hand hovered over the phone, indecision and frustration causing it to tremble slightly. Letting out a sigh, she dropped her hand to the worktable surface and started tapping an erratic beat with her index finger.

What was stopping her? Just pick up the phone and make the call, dammit!

But she couldn't. The events of the last few days had been disconcerting at best. Seated on a stool at the worktable in her lab, she closed her eyes and once again pictured a room full of…herself…trying to figure out how to seal a breach in the universe that had led to them all ending up in her SGC.

Every team that had come through had been identical, or nearly so, to her own team. Eighteen of them. Eighteen Cameron Mitchells. Eighteen Daniel Jacksons. But not eighteen of her. Because in a few of the alternate realities, she was unavailable for the mission.

On maternity leave.

On her honeymoon.

No one had said who her husband was, but she had a pretty good idea. Were she and Jack O'Neill destined to be together in every universe but this one?

She had thought, perhaps, there was a chance, after the immediate threats had been dealt with, that they might find a way, but then he'd transferred to Washington, and that had changed everything. They had talked on a fairly regular basis while she was assigned to Area 51, ostensibly on business, but also on Cassie-business—the girl had initially dealt with her mother's death fairly well, but had gone downhill after the first anniversary. But since she'd returned to the SGC, they had only spoken once or twice, and that had been all business.

She'd known that his transfer would change their relationship. Distance always had a way of cooling any bonds. But she'd thought that they had built a strong friendship during their years at the SGC. Even if they couldn't see each other every day, she had assumed that they would continue to be close, but the strain in their relationship since she'd come back to the SGC was obvious, and disappointing.

Sam reached out for the phone, and got as far as grabbing the receiver out of the cradle before slamming it down again in frustration.

It should have been a simple matter of picking up the phone and dialing his number. It had been two days. Two days since they had sent the last of the teams back. Two days since the other Janet Frazier had said that her Sam Carter was out on maternity leave. But every time she sat down in her lab, she went through the same routine. She would try several times to work up the nerve to call him, and would eventually give up.

She blew a puff of air up to knock her bangs out of her eyes, as well as clear her mind and strengthen her resolve, and for the fifth time that day, reached for the phone. Dialing the General's home number—which she had, by now, memorized—she waited for him to answer, swearing to herself that she wasn't going to chicken out this time.

"O'Neill," came the familiar voice at the other end of the line.

Sam froze, unable to form a coherent word. She hadn't gotten this far in two days of trying, and now she was at a loss.

"Carter?" O'Neill asked, having checked the caller ID and recognized the number immediately.

Sam shook her head and finally spoke. "Sir," she choked out.

"You okay?" he asked, clearly sensing she wasn't.

"I…I just…I was thinking…," she stammered. Oh great, she thought, way to sound like an idiot.

"Isn't it a little late to be at work?" he teased, glancing at the clock on his mantle. The face showed just past midnight, which made it after ten in Colorado.

Sam's head dropped into her free hand, now propped up on her worktable. "I'm sorry, sir," she said quietly. "I should have looked at a clock before calling. I've probably woken you up."

"Nah," he assured her. "I was just working on some paperwork. Didn't realize it had gotten so late, actually."

Which wasn't exactly true. He'd been waiting for her call for the last two days, figuring she'd want to talk about what happened at some point. It had to have been disorienting, at the least, to have so many copies of herself in the SGC at once. And knowing that her brain wouldn't stop working until it had analyzed the whole thing to death, he'd waited patiently for her to call.

"Are you sure you're alright?" he asked again, when the silence stretched on a bit longer.

"Yeah…no, not really," she said, uncomfortable with the sudden burst of honesty.

"Care to share?"

Sam lapsed back into silence, contemplating how she wanted to open this particular topic. Jack beat her to it.

"So, things must have been weird the last few days, huh?" he asked, trying to give her the opening he knew she was searching for.

"You knew?" she asked, stunned.

"Landry called me after the third SG-1 came through," he admitted. "I asked him to keep me informed after that."

"It was…weird," she answered his question of a few moments before. Now that she was talking to him, she felt silly. What was she worried about? What was it about the whole situation that had been so bad?

When the silence stretched on, Jack spoke up. "I heard that you were missing on a few of the SG-1s," he said, getting to the heart of the matter.

Sam sighed. She ought to have known he'd figure it out. Shaking her head, she took a deep breath. "Did the General tell you why?"

"He said one of 'em was on her honeymoon," Jack said, chuckling. "I guess that's one way of getting you out of the lab."

"Yeah," Sam cringed. But not the only way. "The…um…the other…me…was—"

"On maternity leave," Jack said quietly. The only other way to get her out of the lab, so he'd discovered.

The line fell silent once more. And it wasn't a comfortable silence, either. It was awkward and laden with words unsaid. Words they both knew needed to be said, but were both afraid to say. This moment was the perfect opportunity, except that neither one of them seemed capable of forcing them out.

It was Jack who spoke first. "So what's really bugging you, Sam?"

Sam. He never called her that. Always Carter, never Sam. Suddenly, the distance between them seemed to shrink back a little. Emboldened, she spoke.

"Do you ever wonder why we're together in every other reality but this one?"

Jack let out the breath he'd been holding, and Sam could swear she felt it through the receiver. She'd hit the nail on the head, alright.

"Yeah, I wondered about that when Landry told me what Janet—their Janet—said," he admitted quietly.

Again, silence. But this time it was more contemplative. He'd thought a lot over the last two days about what had made his counterpart in at least three different universes take the chance and commit to Sam. In at least one of those universes, she was a civilian, but that didn't change the people they were, or the rules they lived by. So what was different? Was he different? Was she?

"Was I being selfish in those other universes?" he asked, thinking out loud. "I'd like to think I'm not capable of that, but maybe I am."

"They were still working together at the SGC, though," Sam pointed out. "Even if either of them had behaved selfishly, they made it work, somehow. Why can't we?"

That last part was said on a whisper, and Jack gasped at the raw emotion behind it. Sam's head popped up at his sharp intake of breath, suddenly realizing what she'd said.

"I'm sorry," she stammered. "I didn't—"

"It's okay, Sam," he soothed her. "You didn't say anything I haven't thought a thousand times since I left for Washington."

Sam dropped her head back into her hand, gripping the receiver with white knuckles. "We've put everything and everyone ahead of our own happiness, Jack," she said quietly, for once speaking without censoring herself. "I'm tired of living like that. When is it going to be our turn?"

There it was. The bottom line. The last chance. And the ultimate choice. What he said next would change his future, and he knew it. He was a man who lived with regrets as constant companions, and he'd grown used to that feeling. But could he live with one more regret?

Taking a deep breath to fortify himself, he said the only thing he could. "It's late, Sam, and you're tired. Go home, get some sleep."

She sighed. That was it, then. Neither of them could bridge the gap between them, and in one simple call all her future hopes and dreams had shattered. "You're right," she said, her voice shaking slightly. "I'm too tired to deal with all this tonight."

"Damn straight," he said cheerfully. "I'll be at your house with coffee and a hug first thing in the morning. If that doesn't help, nothing will."

"What?" she practically shrieked.

Jack held the phone away from his ear, wincing in pain. "I'm gonna see if I can grab the last transport out to Peterson tonight," he told her, resting the phone against his ear once more. "It'll be close, but I think I can make it."

"But why?" she asked, voice still shaky.

"Because we need to talk about the future," he said, tenderness lacing his voice. "And I want to be able to see your face when we do."

"Are you sure?" she had to ask.

"I'm not saying things are going to change overnight," he told her. "I think sometimes that the reason we're still around when the other SGCs aren't is because you and I never…you know."

"Yeah," Sam nodded her head. "I've thought about that too."

"But we can't hide from this forever, either," he finished his thought. "So, let's talk about it, really talk. See what we can come up with."

Sam sighed again. "Okay, we'll talk."

"Good," he smiled into the phone. "Now I was serious about you getting out of there. You need to rest. It's been a long week."

"You're telling me?" Sam rejoined, a small smile on her face.

"Just like old times, huh?"

"Yeah," she said, smiling bigger now. "I'll see you in the morning."

"See you in the morning, Sam," Jack said.

The line went dead, and Sam replaced the receiver back in its cradle. She sighed and ran her hands through her hair, trying to sort through the varying emotions running through her. She closed her eyes and took a deep, cleansing breath, then another, then another, trying to order her thoughts and calm her nerves.

Opening her eyes, she looked around her lab, seeing the chaos that had erupted around her. She'd been such an emotional wreck after the last of the teams had gone that she hadn't bothered to clean up after herself. All sixteen of herselves. But she wasn't going to do it tonight, either. Standing up, she stretched, hearing the pop of her back as she worked out the kinks that had developed over the last several hours. Collecting her things, she flipped the lights off and locked the door behind her.

As she walked down the corridor, she kept coming back to one thought. He still wanted her. He was leaving Washington and coming all the way out to Colorado just to see her and talk about what comes next. It wasn't perfect, and she knew that Jack was right: things might not change. But he was willing to talk about the future. That was more than they'd even tried to do in so long.

It wasn't much, but it was a start. And just the thought of it made her steps lighter.

~Finis


End file.
